You're Family Now
by moonswirl
Summary: Gleekathon, day 1094a: As she waits for Santana to return from their wedding errands, Brittany greets two of their guests coming in from Lima. - Anniversary cycle day 2 of 21, shift A


_Started my daily ficlets to make the hiatus pass, then decided to keep going with a 2nd cycle, and then a 3rd, 4th, etc through 52nd cycle. Now cycle 53!_

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_**THIRD ANNIVERSARY CYCLE: **It's late October again, and within this cycle I will be completing my third year of daily gleekathon stories and commencing a fourth! As in previous years, this means special things happening. I've selected my favorite stories from throughout the year, and I'll be treating them to something special. In previous years this included Prequel, Sequel, and POV Swap, and then Additional Scenes and Alternate Endings. This year I'm adding two new treatments: Genre Swap (I think that's pretty straightforward) and Element Change (I change one thing in the story, see how it affects the rest). Note that in both these cases and some of the others, there may excerpts directly transferred from the story it references. Also, since this year saw the addition of 'shift days', and since I suck at picking, I have selected 42 stories, to be treated two per day! So here we go!_

_**This story** is Additional Scenes to Not One More Year Without, a Trinity series story, originally posted on December 31 2011.  
_

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_**This is a double shift day.** There will be one more upload today: In Dark Corners._

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**"You're Family Now"  
(Older) Brittany, Catalina & Mrs. Lopez  
Trinity series extra  
****_(all series now listed under the communities tab in my profile)_**  


After being out running errands, braving the storm that was beating on them, she found standing in Hattie's office, getting changed into her blue dress to be oddly relaxing. She was peeling off the weight of the warm clothes and turning into a girl all over again. Pulling the dress on, she could remember that, within hours, she would call Santana Lopez her wife, and her heart went mad. Her hair was let down, still looking presentable, and she was just finishing touch ups when there was a knock at the door. Believing it was Santana, she had gone up there with a smile, pressing her ear close.

"Who is it?" she asked with a smirk.

"It's me," she heard Quinn's voice and with a blink, Brittany opened the door. "Hey, it…" Quinn started, pausing a beat to notice the new look with a smile. "You might want to come out here for a minute," she nodded back to the bar's main area.

"Why?" Brittany asked, and Quinn nodded again. "Is it… bad…" she shook her head nervously, thinking maybe another problem would have arisen.

"I really don't think so," Quinn smiled, offering her hand. Brittany let out a breath and took it. Quinn led her off toward the bar, where she could see her mother talking with two women, still wearing coats and covered with snow. It wasn't until she got closer and the taller one turned her head that she gasped, realizing just who it was: Santana's little sister Catalina and their mother.

"Brittany!" Catalina spotted her and came up, just barely stopping herself. "Wait, I'm going to drip all over you."

"Come with me, I can take care of that," Brittany beamed, looking from her to Mrs. Lopez. The woman smiled to her, following as the blonde lead them to the office. She helped them strip off their coats, careful not to drip all over Hattie's floor. Once they were clear, Brittany had hugged her future sister-in-law. "She's going to be so happy to see you're here… both here," she had turned to the mother, wondering if it was alright to hug her. The only times she would get to see her would be when she and Santana visited Lima, and Brittany usually didn't know how to behave around her, knowing how bad things had been between Santana and her, feeling like this had all been her fault. None of this would have happened if Santana hadn't been compelled to follow her to Boston. Except now she was here, she had travelled out from Ohio to New York, on this day which was to be her first daughter's wedding, and Brittany doubted that it would be in order to prevent the union… at least she hoped it wasn't.

"Brittany," the woman had spoken then, drawing her attention as she held out her hands. She was smiling, and Brittany felt her worries fade. She placed her hands in hers, smiling. "I want you to know, because sometimes I don't think you realize it, how much you matter, to all of us… I know how happy you make my daughter, and I'm sorry it took me this long to get to say it, the way my girls have. It dawned on me this morning that after all these years we were still making one another pay for the past, and that if I didn't… get past it… I wouldn't get to be a part of my daughter's life, not anymore. If I wasn't here today, then I would lose her forever."

"She wouldn't…" Brittany had started to say, but Mrs. Lopez stopped her, and she didn't try to say it again. She might have wanted to be nice about it, but deep down she knew the mother was right about this. Santana wouldn't have forgiven her missing the wedding, not in her heart, and that was where it mattered. "But you're here now," she continued instead. "She's going to be so happy when she sees you."

"Will she?" the woman looked so hopeful that it pained Brittany's heart. She could see so much of Santana in her. They looked the same, mother and daughter, when they thought of one another.

"She'll be crying, like you," Brittany reached for the box of tissues on Hattie's desk and offered it to her future mother-in-law, who couldn't help but laugh at this.

"It's been too long of not being part of your lives, both of you," Mrs. Lopez made sure to specify, which touched Brittany deeply.

"We're stubborn, it's a thing," Catalina had piped in, getting a look from her mother and a smirk from Brittany. "Not like she won't know by now anyway," she pointed out, and Brittany more or less turned away rather than to have to answer, resisting a laugh.

"Are you hungry?" she managed to speak again then. "You must be, with your travel…" Catalina gave a decisive nod. "I'll be right back."

Brittany had gone seeking something, anything that she could bring back, eventually finding some sandwiches and juices, which she brought back. Catalina was looking at her reflection in the mirror, fixing her hair, while Mrs. Lopez sat very quietly by the desk.

"Are you okay?" Brittany asked her.

"Nervous," the mother tried to laugh, but her voice was shaking. "She may be angry at me, and she has every right to be, but…" Brittany put the food down and got down to be at eye level with the seated woman. She offered her hands, just as Mrs. Lopez had done before, and once she had put her hands in her future daughter-in-law's hands, the girl smiled.

"We're family now, right? Or we will be in a few hours…"

"We already are," Mrs. Lopez confirmed, and Brittany gave a nod.

"Family is there for each other when they can, and I promise, no matter what happens, I'll be there, and I won't give up. I can be stubborn, too." Mrs. Lopez smiled back at her, touching her cheeks.

"I hope so." Brittany reached over, pulling the plate closer.

"Eat," she told her, standing up. She turned to Catalina, who once more came up to embrace her.

"I can see why she ran after you," she whispered at Brittany's ear, and the bride beamed, giving the younger Lopez a tight squeeze.

When she'd left the two of them to eat, so she could be on the lookout for Santana's return, Brittany felt the anticipation of what was to come, not just the wedding but this reunion. She hoped for Santana's sake that everything would work out. She had seen more than anyone just how it would affect her future wife, this separation from her family in Lima. It had been the hardest after the death of Mr. Lopez, hard for all of them. On this day though, they could make him proud, wherever he was, to know that the girls he'd loved so much could start to really mend toward a future together. It would be one more thing that would start fresh with the new year, and that was all they'd ever wanted.

THE END

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******A/N: This is a one-shot ficlet, which means that signing up for story alert will not bring you any alerts.  
****In the event of a sequel, the story will be separate from this one. And as chapter stories go, they are  
************always clearly indicated as such [ex: "Days 204-210" in the summary] Thank you!**


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